This is a fairly recent vintage that many of you might have tasted in its main format 187 ml. However, after bottling a second round of this in the early fall of 2022 we ran out of small bottles.
Seeing as this second round was a touch better than its previous iteration on account of it being in barrel longer we didn’t want to lose the momentum we felt it had and so decided to bottle the remaining couple hundred liters in 375 ml bottle.
At the release in 2019 I wrote of the vintage,
“The 2018 is curious in that an usually large part of it was shaped more by its ageing than we are otherwise used to. When we barrelled it in 2019 it was fairly low in alcohol and had a higher degree of residual sugar. Then in the spring of 2020 a fair amount of it started fermenting slowly again and we decided to roll with it rather than try and stop anything. What came out the other end was higher in alcohol than expected but also with a closer balance between acidity and residual sugar than we had first envisioned. It seems the ice cider “wanted” to move to that point on its own and we are happy it did. In the bottle this spells a tighter final wine. It will be interesting to see how it handles further ageing in bottle”.
It’s been sitting pretty since bottling, slowing down for a little bit, integrating further, and it is exceptionally drinkable now although you can of course lay it down.
The most common complaint we get is that our bottles are too small and that of course goes especially for the barrel aged wines so now you have the chance of buying a bigger bottle and have more people enjoy it or enjoy larger glasses of this for your self.
A Swedish wine magazine asked me once what the best flavour combo with the barrel aged ice cider. My response was,
“A comfortable chair, a sleeping (gun) dog and an open fire. Possibly, if you’re so inclined, a mild cigar.”
I stand by that.
/Andreas, Brännland Iscider
APPEARANCE
Light golden with amber hue.
NOSE
Ripe apples, notes of barrel but less wood and more clarity than previous vintages.
PALATE
Soft almond and madeleine cookies on the middle palate and a tight, relatively dry finish.
ABV
10.5%